The literature indicates that parental reflective functioning (PRF) is crucial to a good parent-child relationship. Furthermore, genuine parental mentalizing also promotes adaptive emotion regulation in attachment relationships. However, no prior study assessed the relationship between parental mentalizing, emotion regulation and object relation in the early years.

We examined the relationship between PRF, cognitive emotion regulation and perception of the infant among parents of children up to five years old.

In our cross-sectional, non-clinical study, 136 parents completed the Parental Reflective Functioning Questionnaire, the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire and the Mother’s Object Relationship Scale - short form. In our 12 moderator models, we chose the subscales of the parental perception of the infant (invasiveness and warmth) as dependent variables, the subscales of adaptive and non-adaptive strategies of cognitive emotion regulation as independent variables, and the three subscales of PRF (pre-mentalization, interest and curiosity, certainty about mental states) as moderators.

Warmth had a positive, weak correlation with adaptive strategies (r(134) = 0.27, p < 0.007), with certainty in mental states (r(134) = 0.24, p < 0.007) and interest and curiosity (r(134) = 0.23, p < 0.007); the correlation between interest and curiosity and non-adaptive strategies was moderate and positive (r(134) = 0.32, p < 0.007). None of the subscales of PRF moderated the relationship between the subscales of emotion regulation and the perception of the infant. The use of adaptive emotion regulation strategies was more likely to affect the perception of warmth (B = 0.05 (t = 2.0584, p = 0.0415), B = 0.04 (t = 1.7887, p = 0.0760)), and the use of non-adaptive strategies was more likely to affect the perception of invasiveness (B = 0.08 (t = 2.1333, p = 0.0348), B = 0.09 (t = 2.3164, p = 0,0221).

Our results suggest that cognitive emotion regulation plays a role in object relation; therefore, we recommend promoting adaptive cognitive emotion regulation strategies among mothers in the early years.

None Declared

Becoming a psychiatrist, clinical psychologist or psychotherapist involves a complex set of skills that require extensive training. Clinical practice development and professional and personal identity formation are closely intertwined and continue throughout one’s career. Individual and environmental factors influence dropout. The beginning stages of training are incredibly challenging for trainees and can be a time of vulnerability as they face early professional hurdles. We propose that certain educational factors, such as inadequate practical training and insufficient emotional support during professional dilemmas, play a crucial role in manifesting burnout or other symptoms, potentially leading to stagnation in one’s career.

The main objective of our study is to identify causes of disruption and/or discontinuation of the training/residency programs in psychiatry, clinical psychology, and psychotherapy. Our study also aims to highlight the causes of chronic exhaustion among trainees in mental health professions.

The research team has developed a comprehensive questionnaire including two validated psychometric scales, the Effort-Reward Imbalance Questionnaire (ERI, Siegrist et al. Soc Sci Med 2004; 58 1483-99, Salavecz et al. J Men Psychosom 2006; 7 231–246) and the Mental Health Test (MHT, Vargha et al. J Men Psychosom 2020; 21 281–322). A quantitative analysis (Braun et al. Qual. Res. Psychol. 2006; 3 77–101) will be performed on the responses, following which interviews will be conducted with previous volunteers who participated in the study. The interviews will be evaluated through content analysis. Our survey is prepared with the involvement of all significant training centers in Hungary. The study was approved by the United Ethical Review Committee for Research in Psychology (EPKEB, approval numbers: 2021-109, 2023-101).

The participants’ main characteristics and the questionnaires’ results will be summarized with standard statistical methods, while the interviews will be analyzed with the help of qualitative methods.

Based on the results of the described study, we aim to investigate the educational system’s impact on the career development and commitment of psychiatrists, psychologists, and psychotherapists in Hungary. Additionally, the research will yield valuable perspectives on how these factors affect the mental well-being of these professionals. Ultimately, the results could help address areas of concern and improve mental health professionals’ training.

* Presenting author

** The two authors contributed equally.

None Declared

A complex, Nature-, and Adventure Therapy - integrated Schema Therapeutic program (N-ABST) and a related efficacy study was launched in 2022 April at the Psychotherapy Department, at Semmelweis University. The participants had the opportunity of having outdoor, experience based group processes – seven full days in a month - in addition to the classic Schema Therapy (ST) sessions. According to the study design, 4-week long traditional thematic ST programs and 4-week long N-ABST programs were taken place alternately.

Our aim was to compare the efficacy in a randomized, controlled design, short and medium terms. The participants of the programs and thus the target group of the research were adults, diagnosed mainly with Borderline Personality Disorder, inpatients in psychiatry.

This methodological innovation also meant the integration of two therapeutic teams in practice. When establishing the collaboration, we put emphasis on finding common points and understanding how N-AT contributes to schema therapy goals. During our joint work, it became clear that the elemental need for contact with nature enriched the schema therapy approach with a new basic need that was not included in it before. Measurements were taken before the start of the entire program and at the end of the 4-week cycle. Preliminary results are presented based on the Personality Inventory for DSM-5 - Hungarian Short Form (PID-5-HSF), and the Derogatis Symptom Checklist (SCL90).

In the N-ABST group (n=23) the PID5 “Dysinhibition” scale (p < .01, Cohen’s d = .636), and the “Negative Affectivity” scale (p < .05, Cohen’s d = .388) showed significantly lower scores after therapy. In the case of the “Detachment” we have found a tendency to decrease after the therapy. Regarding the comparison of the effectiveness of N-ABST and classical Schema Therapy - with the current state of analysis - there was a significant difference in the PID5 values for “Suspiciousness” and “Manipulativeness”. The former characteristic was reduced to a greater extent by the schema therapy, and the latter by the N-ABST therapy. Based on the SCL90, the N-ABST program resulted in a significant symptom reduction measured by the following subscales: somatization, obsessive compulsive, interpersonal sensitivity, depression, phobia. Global symptom severity also decreased significantly (p < .05, Cohen’s d = .588).

According to our results, Nature- Adventure Therapy enhanced Schema Therapy seems to be an innovative and efficient method in the psychotherapy of personality disorders. Besides the effectiveness, there is a great challenge to design programs that are sustainable and therefore serves therapy long term as well.

This study was supported by the National Research, Development and Innovation Office grant K 129195.

None Declared

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most prevalent chronic neuropsychiatric disorders in children and adolescents; however, it continues into adulthood in 4-77% of the cases. Due to executive dysfunction, adults with ADHD may have deficits in personal strengths, as well as difficulties utilizing existing strengths in challenging situations, which may add to the functional impairments associated with ADHD in adults.

Therefore, we aimed to explore the association between personal strengths and ADHD symptoms in a community sample of adults.

Five hundred and twenty-eight adults (mean age = 21.41 years, SD = 2.29, range: 18 ̶ 28, female: N = 488, 92.4%) filled out an online questionnaire after giving their informed consent. Personal strengths were assessed using Bernstein’s Strengths Scale (BSS) which measures sixteen positive attributes grouped into four higher-order factors: self-directedness (Identity, Self-reflection, Self-confidence, Self-assertion, Imagination/Creativity), self-regulation (Emotional balance, Resilience, Self-control, Self-care, Reality testing), connection (Empathy, Compassion, Humour, Responsibility), and transcendence (Gratitude and Wisdom). ADHD symptoms were measured by the screening version (Part A) of the Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS).

Participants who were screened positive in ASRS (N = 247, 46.7%) scored lower in all but four BSS subscales than participants who were screened negative (N = 280, 53.3%). Effect sizes reached the medium level (Cohen’s d > .5) for Self-confidence, Self-care, Responsibility and Wisdom, and were small (Cohen’s d > .2) for Identity, Self-assertion, Imagination, Resilience, Reality-testing, Emotional balance, and Gratitude. However, no group differences were found in the Self-reflection, Empathy, Compassion, and Humour subscales of the BSS.

Our results suggest that ADHD symptoms in adults may be associated with deficits in personal strengths; that is, adults with ADHD may have difficulties, especially in trusting in their abilities, qualities, and judgements, in taking care of their own emotional and physical well-being, in taking responsibilities and in being open to learning from their experiences. Addressing personal strengths in psychosocial interventions for adult ADHD may improve patients’ functioning.

This research has been supported by the National Research, Development, and Innovation Office, OTKA-PD-134849 and ÚNKP-22-2-I-ELTE-854 grants.

None Declared

At Kiskunhalas Semmelweis Hospital, a special mobile container hospital was set up to care for patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 during the first wave of the pandemic.

We aimed to create a proactive integrated mental health protection system for the frontline healthcare workers that provides an opportunity for psychophysiological monitoring of stress and crisis during shifts, as well as providing staff with more lasting methods of coping with difficulties.

From the ascending branch of the second wave, every two weeks on the workers’ rest day, mental helpers initiated a phone call to each employee participating in the program. If it was necessary, we provided psychological counseling, crisis intervention, brief psychotherapy, and psychopharmacotherapy. In addition, self-operated psychophysiological screening devices were used at the frontline work site, which provided an opportunity for continuous telemedicine monitoring.

In our department, three psychologists and three psychiatrists kept in touch with an average of 150 frontline workers per month. Interventions were needed for a total of over 24% in December and January, over 17% in February and March, almost 9% in April, and only 4% in May. Helpers rated an average of two-thirds of these cases as moderate. They faced severe stress 2-3 times a month in sum, and for 2-3 workers needed medication.

Without a mental support system, self-report-based data suggest that nearly half of responders working at the frontline reached the threshold of clinically significant mental syndromes (Greenberg et al, 2021). Using our mental health support system, one-fifth of the workers needed intervention.

No significant relationships.

The COVID-MENTA Screening Program was developed to monitor the mental health of frontline healthcare professionals and identify those at high risk for suicide at the Kiskunhalas Mobile Disease Control Hospital.

Our post hoc analysis aimed to investigate the association between psychological distress and suicide ideation based on passively collected data during the screening work.

A sample of 50 healthcare professionals was analyzed from 167 participants in the COVID-MENTA Screening Program between the second and third waves of the COVID-19 pandemic. Data collection was performed during the breaks of healthcare professionals at work. Half of the group (N=25) perceived severe distress (scored > 5/10 on Distress Thermometer). The crisis monitoring application was based on Klonsky and May’s 3-step theory (2015) and was built by adapting the questions on the appropriate international scales (Psychache Scale, Beck’s Hopelessness Scale, Interpersonal Needs Questionnaire, Suicide Capacity Scale). The tool can stratify the current suicide risk into seven levels.

Spearman’s Rank Correlation was used for statistical analysis. There was a significant positive correlation between the psychological distress and the suicide risk (r (48) = 0,43, p < 0,01).

Our findings supported the hypothesis of the study that the risk of suicide rises with the increase of the level of distress. The application has been proved effective in ecological conditions, helping in several cases to screen individuals currently at increased risk for suicide, allowing us to intervene in a timely and effective manner.

No significant relationships.

Early diagnosis and treatment of depression are associated with better prognosis. We used baseline data of the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging (2012–2015; ages 45–85 years) to examine differences in prevalence and predictors of undiagnosed depression (UD) between immigrants and non-immigrants at baseline and persistent and/or emerging depressive symptoms (DS) 18 months later. At this second time point, we also examined if a mental health care professional (MHCP) had been consulted.

We excluded individuals with any prior mood disorder and/or current anti-depressive medication use at baseline. UD was defined as the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression 10 score ⩾10. DS at 18 months were defined as Kessler 10 score ⩾19. The associations of interest were examined in multivariate logistic regression models.

Our study included 4382 immigrants and 18 620 non-immigrants. The mean age (standard deviation) in immigrants was 63 (10.3) years v. 65 (10.7) years in non-immigrants and 52.1% v. 57.1% were male. Among immigrants, 12.2% had UD at baseline of whom 34.2% had persistent DS 18 months later v. 10.6% and 31.4%, respectively, among non-immigrants. Female immigrants were more likely to have UD than female non-immigrants (odds ratio 1.50, 95% confidence interval 1.25–1.80) but no difference observed for men. The risk of persistent DS and consulting an MHCP at 18 months did not differ between immigrants and non-immigrants.

Female immigrants may particularly benefit from depression screening. Seeking mental health care in the context of DS should be encouraged.